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Personal Capital picks Denver as hub for its financial advisers

Personal Capital, a digital wealth manager, will make Denver the hub of its financial advisory business, with plans to hire 100 people over the next two years, the company's CEO announced Tuesday.

"It is a new era, a digital era, in financial services," Bill Harris said.

Harris said individually managed accounts in the U.S. represent $32 trillion in assets and that the financial-services industry is ripe for a technology-driven transformation.

The San Francisco startup, which bills itself as a "next-generation money manager," has developed software and mobile applications that allow clients to manage multiple financial accounts on one site and to work remotely with a financial adviser.

Harris said the company's technology allows it to efficiently reach the "broad middle market." Personal Capital's minimum threshold for advisory services is $100,000, although its financial-planning tools are available at no charge.

Wealth-management fees, all in, are less than 1 percent of assets, Harris said.

Because it isn't building a broad network of branches, the company needed a geographically central location with workers who had financial-planning expertise.

The Denver hub will serve clients from Bangor, Maine, to San Diego, Harris said. San Francisco will remain the headquarters and oversee technology development.

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Denver Mayor Michael Hancock said about 6 percent of the Denver workforce is in financial services, and Personal Capital's decision further builds on the city's reputation as a hub in that sector. "We promise we won't let you down," Hancock told Harris.

Harris was a print journalist early in his career before helping develop several disruptive technologies. He worked at the company that created TurboTax and eventually headed Intuit as CEO. He was also the CEO of PayPal, a pioneer in digital payments.

The Colorado Economic Development Commission approved $1.6 million in job-growth-incentive tax credits for Personal Capital in return for the creation of 213 new jobs over the next five years.

The company has leased a full floor at Denver Place downtown. It received a $27 million round of venture financing in June.

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